Dearest Members and Visitors of our Little Fountain Pen Nut House on the Digital Prairie,

As it says in the title, we are back and here to stay.

Apologies for the unplanned downtime. Unfortunately, we had no other option with the restrictions imposed on our old server and its resource problems, and making sure everything we did was done in a secure way.

We are now on a server with tons of capacity, significantly faster and better equipped, and also easily scalable for a change if the need arises, funds permitting. BTW, all this at the same cost as the old server.

We would like to thank you all for your support received backchannel. It was most appreciated during the long hours we made to get the new server up and running as quickly as humanly possible. My thanks particularly go to our own Salman, who spent several days and nights setting up some very nifty and advanced security measures and generally assisting with other stuff. Without him, this would have taken quite a bit longer, and that is an understatement. I can't thank him enough.

We are back right in time to celebrate the New Year with all of you, and what a wonderful way to start the New Year for FPN too! Things can only improve from here onwards, with all signs auspicious too, with interesting new developments coming our way too .

Let's all relax, sit back, partake in and enjoy this wonderful community, which we all built together.

Finally, slightly belated, but hoping you all had a great time, with more to come:

Thank you all, and may 2014 be your best year yet!

Warmest regards, Wim

On behalf of the entire Moderator and Admin Team

the Mad Dutchmanlaugh a little, love a little, live a lot; laugh a lot, love a lot, live forever

I was going through the early stages of withdrawal when the FPN finally got back online, haha. Glad to know all's well now, and sorry to hear that you all went through such difficulty. Thanks for all the trouble, Mods & Admins!

And yeah, 2014 is about four hours away on my end, so I'll be saying this in advance: Happy new year, all!

Cheers, and glad to be back!

Kevin

"The price of an object should not only be what you had to pay for it, but also what you've had to sacrifice in order to obtain it." - The Wisdom of The Internet

During the hiatus, I satisfied my addiction by using a long dormant account at FP Geeks. I plan to continue visiting it at intervals now, as it seems ungracious only to show up there in an emergency, but FPN has become an important part of my Internet routine. I wouldn't want to give it up.

I realize that this must have been a lot of work at a time of year when people like to kick back a little. Thanks to all who got us up and running in time for the new year.

"I hope life isn't a big joke, because I don't get it.”
-- Jack Handey